The Human Rights Watch in its new report has seriously condemned the wide spread discrimination and violence against women with disabilities mainly Northern Uganda.

some northern Uganda women at a HIV testing center

The 73-page report that has been released today is called “’As if we aren’t human’: Discrimination and Violence against women with Disabilities in Northern Uganda,” highlights the frequent abuse and discrimination against women with disabilities from the North both by not only strangers but also their neighbors and family members.

An advocate and researcher of HRW, has told journalists at Grand Imperial Hotel that the report is based interviews with 64 women and girls with a wide range of disabilities which are caused by diseases such as Polio and others by landmine and gunshot wounds that they sustained during the insurgency in the north of Uganda.

Bariga says according to the research they made, they have discovered that since women with disabilities are particularly more vulnerable to sexual and gender based violence they are likely to have suffered more violence against them during the Konyi Insurgence than other groups of people.

She says for instance more than one third of the women with disabilities that the HRW interviewed to during the research experienced some form of sexual and physical abuse though none of them had been able to press for the prosecution of their abusers.

She says though these women have suffered violence their plight has been ignored because their no one has paid attention to their calls for help.

“One of the untold stories of the long war in Northern Uganda and its aftermath is the isolation, neglect and abuse of women with disabilities,” says Barriga.

“Hence in the struggle to reconstruct livelihoods in the north, the government and humanitarian agencies need to make sure that women with disabilities are not left out.”

According to a 2007 national survey, 20% of Ugandans are disabled and Northern Uganda is believed to have higher disability rates because of the war- related injuries that people in the north suffered during the insurgence and the limited access to vaccinations and treatment for these injuries in the region.

By Zakaria Tiberindwa, Ultimate Media